Friday, May 27

Paint Small

I did something last week that I haven’t done in a long
time. I painted small.

Of course, the term small is relative. Small for you and
small for me may be two entirely different things.

I have read and actually seen drawings and “paintings” that
were rendered on the head of a pin. Why on earth anyone would do that,
other than the sheer novelty of it, is beyond me. I don’t enjoy peering through
a magnifying glass to view artwork.

Anyway, when I say small, I mean smaller than a full sheet of
watercolor paper, which is 22 x 30 in. (56 x 76 cm). So my latest painting is
on a half-sheet, and I didn’t even use all of that real estate either. My painting
is only 9 x 16 in. (23 x 41 cm.). Again, that’s small for me.

Why did I enjoy it? Well, I like that you can paint a small
painting relatively quickly. I think I spent about four hours over a couple of
days, which was great since I am having a very busy May as I told you in a recentblog.Also, the smaller size meant that I didn’t fuss with the
details, which I sometimes do in a larger painting. That is, I sort of painted
the whole thing at once. My painting is a simple landscape, so it was ground,
trees, sky---one, two, three. Easy.

I like the result, and so I have decided to do a series of
the same motif, but in different seasons as suggested to me by an artist
friend. I’m looking forward to it.